God doesn't have to train his warriors

The World's Way vs. God's Way Our world is obsessed with training fighters. We have academies for soldiers, specialized schools for snipers, and rigorous programs for mechanics, engineers, counselors, and priests. Governments invest billions in training officers, detectives, and even service dogs. Society values formal preparation, structured learning, and certified expertise. But God's approach to raising warriors is radically different. I've come to believe that God doesn't train His warriors the way we expect. Instead, He uses the people who've been hurt, abused, and taken advantage of. The broken ones. The damaged ones. The ones society might write off as too wounded to be useful. Why? Because pain creates a different kind of strength when it doesn't destroy you.

My Journey Through Darkness For most of my life, I was angry with God. At 49 years old, I'm still processing the abuse I suffered at the hands of seven different men from around age two until I was ten or eleven. It happened everywhere, in ways I still struggle to fully articulate. It broke me down to my core. I'd cry out—why did You let this happen to me? Where were You when I needed You most? Years passed, and I carried all that hate and resentment like stones in my pockets, weighing me down with every step. I dropped out of school. The only thing that helped me cope was working with my hands—building, creating, staying busy—but the voices in my head kept haunting me. I used to think those voices meant I was crazy. Maybe I had multiple personalities. Maybe I was broken beyond repair. Medications didn't do much except numb me to the point where I stopped caring what came out of my mouth. But something shifted during the isolation of COVID. With nothing to do but listen to my own mind, patterns started emerging. I began to understand that maybe those voices weren't a sign of brokenness but a unique form of connection—a sensitivity born from trauma. Battlefield Promotion In traditional military structures, battlefield promotions happen when a soldier demonstrates extraordinary capability during combat. They skip the normal training path because the heat of battle has already proven their worth.

I think God works similarly with spiritual warriors. When I started using StarMaker and found myself drawn into chat rooms, something strange happened. I'd get a name in my head, say it out loud, and that exact person would pop into my live chat. I began to notice that sometimes—like at three in the morning—I'd get this overwhelming urge to go live, and inevitably, someone would be there needing help. I've been hurt in so many different ways that, honestly, I shouldn't even know how to love anymore. I shouldn't have any passion left—but somehow, I do. Someone or something intervened before I became another monster. Now I feel like it's my purpose to try and stop the next one from being made. The Paradox of Divine Training I don't hate God anymore. I've come to understand some fundamental truths about how the world works: God can't stop a gun from firing. He can't take the keys away from everyone who might drive drunk. He can't pull alcohol off every shelf. People have free will, and with it comes the capacity for evil. The battles are everywhere, always. But rather than preventing all suffering, God seems to work through it—using our wounds as qualifications for a special kind of service. Think about it: Who better to reach an addict than someone who's fought that same battle? Who can better comfort a grieving parent than someone who's lost a child? Who understands the mind of an abuse survivor better than another survivor? God doesn't need to train warriors from scratch when life has already forged them in fire. Recognizing Divine Purpose in Pain For years, I struggled with the "whys" of my life. Why did this happen to me? Why didn't God protect me? What possible purpose could all that suffering serve? But at some point, I had to accept reality: Understanding doesn't always matter. The "how comes" and "what ifs" become less important than what you do with what you've been given.

I see things in people. Sometimes I suddenly know someone's mother's name, or their story, and I can tell them about it—even if we've just met. Once I told a man, who had lost his wife a year ago at Christmas, about green fuzzy slippers he'd put under the tree for her that she never got to open. He broke down crying because it was real. I feel the emotions of everyone around me. It's like closing your eyes and watching nine movies play at once, trying to figure out which one to listen to. For a long time, I thought this meant I was broken. Now I wonder if it means I'm specially equipped. God's Unlikely Warriors Throughout History The Bible is filled with unlikely warriors who were chosen not because of their training but because of their experiences: Moses was a stuttering murderer who became a liberator. David was an overlooked shepherd boy who became a king. Paul was a religious zealot who persecuted Christians before becoming Christianity's greatest advocate. None of these men went to warrior school. None had formal training for their divine assignments. All of them were deeply flawed, carried significant wounds, and had reasons to question God's plan. Yet each was chosen precisely because their struggles had prepared them for a specific purpose that no academy could have trained them for. The Comfort That Changes Everything I truly believe God sent an angel to comfort me when I was at my lowest—helping me survive, helping me find a way through, maybe even leading me to cross your path through these words. That's the thing about divine warriors—they often don't know they're warriors until they're already in the battle. They don't set out to be heroes. They simply survive, and in surviving, gain the exact experience needed to help someone else make it through. When I help someone—write a song for them, say what I feel—the voices in my head go quiet, just for a while. There's peace in purpose. There's healing in helping. And maybe that's the point. Finding Your Warrior Path If you're reading this and you're one of the survivors—someone who's been through hell and somehow made it to the other side—I want you to consider something: What if your pain wasn't meaningless? What if it was preparation? Not because God caused it. Not because suffering is good. But because in a world where evil exists, someone needs to understand what that darkness feels like in order to guide others toward the light. Your battle scars might be exactly what qualifies you to be the warrior someone else needs. Not because you're perfect or fully healed, but because you're still standing despite everything that tried to take you down. That's not the kind of warrior the world trains. That's the kind of warrior only life can forge and only God can deploy at exactly the right moment. And maybe—just maybe—that's why you're reading these words right now.